Recovery

Strain recovers quickly during play, while Wounds represent more serious injury and recover more slowly over time. The following are the default recovery rates. Universes may adjust recovery pacing to match genre, tone, danger level, available supplies, and access to care.

Recovering Wounds

Wounds do not heal quickly on their own. After a full night's rest or equivalent, recover Wounds equal to Might.

If receiving medical care, the caregiver makes a Medicine check. Difficulty is based on conditions, supplies, and severity. Each net Success restores 1 additional Wound. 2 Boons may restore 1 extra Wound, preserve supplies, or reduce recovery time.

Field Treatment

During structured play, a character may use an Action to provide urgent medical aid to an Engaged character. The caregiver makes a Medicine check using the difficulty named by the injury, condition, or GM. If no difficulty is listed, use Average for battlefield care.

Field treatment can stop bleeding, prevent an immediate worsening effect, allow a character to remain alive long enough for proper treatment, or satisfy a Critical Injury entry that calls for medical aid. It does not remove the Critical Injury itself unless that entry or the GM specifically allows it. Improvised tools, unsafe surroundings, or rushed work add Bane Dice.

Recovering Strain

Strain recovers rapidly. At the end of any structured encounter, characters recover Strain equal to Willpower. During a full nights rest, recover all Strain unless the character was incapacitated by Strain.

As a Maneuver once per encounter, any character with Strain Points may Catch Breath and recover 1 Strain. Minions and Elites do not have Strain Points and cannot Catch Breath. The Catch Breath talent improves the recovery to 2 Strain once per encounter without changing the Maneuver type or limit. Spend 1 Boon with no stronger use to recover 1 Strain.

Recovering from Incapacitation

A character incapacitated by Wounds is out of the encounter. After the encounter ends, they stabilize unless another character or effect specifies otherwise. Universes define long-term consequences of incapacitation.

A character incapacitated by Strain does not recover all Strain from a full rest. Instead, after a full rest, reduce current Strain to half the character's Strain Points, rounded down. The character may still carry ongoing effects from any Critical Injuries or conditions accumulated.

Recovering Critical Injuries

Critical Injuries require active treatment. The immediate effect of a Critical Injury may be temporary, such as falling prone, losing a Maneuver, dropping an item, or adding Bane Dice for a short time. The Critical Injury itself remains until removed through medical care.

Each existing Critical Injury adds +10 to future Critical Injury rolls. This +10 effect remains until that specific Critical Injury is removed.

If a Universe does not provide a full Critical Injury table, use the following severity bands as the default structure:

d100 Result	Severity
01-30	Minor
31-60	Moderate
61-85	Severe
86-100+	Deadly

To remove a Critical Injury, a caregiver must make a Medicine check with appropriate time and tools. The difficulty is based on the injury's severity:

Severity	Treatment Requirement
Minor	Easy Medicine check; full rest or simple care
Moderate	Average Medicine check; proper supplies and time
Severe	Hard Medicine check; extended care, proper tools, and a safe place to work
Deadly	Severe Medicine check; specialist care, rare resources, surgery, magic, advanced medicine, or story resolution

On success, the Critical Injury is removed and no longer adds +10 to future Critical Injury rolls. On failure, the Critical Injury remains. Banes or a Calamity may consume supplies, worsen the condition, increase recovery time, or create a new complication.

Untreated Critical Injuries may worsen over time if the fiction calls for it. Universes may adjust treatment requirements to match tone, technology, magic, and access to care.

For Universes

Recovery rates, timescales, and specific mechanics are intentionally left flexible here. A gritty survival Universe might make Wound recovery brutal and slow. A cinematic action Universe might allow characters to shrug off wounds between scenes. Both are valid — calibrate recovery to the tone of your Universe.

Default Critical Injury Table

Use this table when the active Universe does not provide its own Critical Injury table.

d100 Result	Severity	Injury	Effect
01-05	Minor	Rattled	Suffer 2 Strain.
06-10	Minor	Knocked Down	You fall Prone.
11-15	Minor	Guard Broken	Until the start of your next turn, reduce Melee Defense and Ranged Defense by 1, minimum 0.
16-20	Minor	Pain Spike	Add 1 Bane Die to your next check before the end of your next turn.
21-25	Minor	Shaken Grip	Drop one held item, or spend one Maneuver to keep hold of it.
26-30	Minor	Open Cut	At the end of the encounter, suffer 1 Wound unless you or an ally spends an Action to bind the injury.
31-35	Moderate	Hampered	You are Immobilized until the end of your next turn.
36-40	Moderate	Staggering Hit	You are Staggered until the end of your next turn.
41-45	Moderate	Cracked Rib	Until the end of the encounter, suffer 1 Strain whenever you take a Maneuver after your first Maneuver on a turn.
46-50	Moderate	Wrenched Limb	Until the end of the encounter, add 1 Bane Die to checks that rely on the injured limb.
51-55	Moderate	Blood in the Eyes	Until the end of the encounter, add 1 Bane Die to Perception checks and ranged attacks.
56-60	Moderate	Nerve Shock	Until the end of the encounter, you cannot voluntarily suffer Strain to gain an extra Maneuver or activate an ability.
61-65	Severe	Deep Wound	At the start of each of your turns, suffer 1 Wound until you or an ally succeeds on an Average Medicine check to stop the bleeding. The Critical Injury remains after the bleeding stops.
66-70	Severe	Disabled Arm	One arm cannot be used effectively until the end of the encounter. Checks requiring both hands add 2 Bane Dice.
71-75	Severe	Damaged Leg	Until the end of the encounter, you cannot take more than one Maneuver on your turn.
76-80	Severe	Concussed	Until the end of the encounter, downgrade one positive die on Intellect, Savvy, and Willpower checks.
81-85	Severe	Internal Injury	Until this Critical Injury is removed, Wound recovery from rest is halved, rounded down, minimum 1.
86-90	Deadly	Crippling Blow	You are Staggered and Immobilized until the end of your next turn. One limb is unusable until this Critical Injury is removed.
91-95	Deadly	Hemorrhage	At the start of each of your turns, suffer 2 Wounds until you or an ally succeeds on a Hard Medicine check to stabilize you. The Critical Injury remains after stabilization.
96-100	Deadly	Mortal Shock	After your next turn, you are incapacitated unless you receive medical aid or recover at least 1 Wound before then.
101-110	Deadly	Broken	You are immediately incapacitated. You remain helpless until you receive medical aid and current Wounds fall below Wound Points.
111+	Deadly	Death's Door	You are immediately incapacitated and will die without urgent medical intervention, powerful healing, or a major narrative rescue. The GM should make the danger clear and give allies a chance to act.